Re: EverNote 1.0

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Note: This message is from the outliners.com archive kindly provided by Dave Winer.

Outliners.com Message ID: 3514

Posted by stephenz
2005-07-18 12:03:27

> I am very visual so perhaps if a veteran Zooter was to sit down with me, and show me how Zoot works I might understand better.

The odd thing about Zoot is that it really isn’t all that hard to use; in fact, it is almost simple. It just doesn’t look that way, and it takes a long time to become familiar with all the features that make it simple… yes, a bit of a contradiction. What makes Zoot so simple is that it is so flexible. You can categorize the heck out of your information, or just dump it in and categorize it later. It makes almost no demands of you… use it how you see fit. After awhile, once you become familiar with the folder/rules concept, you begin to see the real power it has to make sense of your masses of information. It’s like a gold pan: takes sand and rocks, swirls it around with some water and suddenly gold nuggets appear.

Like many of you, I’m sure, my job is mult-faceted. I have got to keep track of all kinds of different data. One Zoot database serves me for transaction tracking. I dump notes about all the transactions I have into one folder, using folder assignments to categorize each item by vendor, product, and type (invoice, order, follow-up). These folder assignments mean that I can open other folders in the database to instantly view all transactions with any particular vendor, or for any single product. It is easy, fast, and almost automatic.

But I have another database as my journal for dumping in various information which includes communications, notes, and reminders. This information is less structured, but just as easy to find when I need it. And, more importantly, it is easy to add this information for almost any source using the Zooter. When you’re reading an e-mail you want to save, just click on the Zooter icon in the upper right corner, select “clip to,” choose the database you want to send it to, and the whole e-mail is saved. I can do it the same with faxes (which I create in a Word template), letters and virtually any textual information that appears on the screen.

And I can make any Zoot item a reminder that will pop up to prod me into action, and then easily mark it as complete once it is.

I have no doubt that ADM, InfoHandler, as well as UltraRecall, can perform these same tasks. But for me, none does them as efficiently, as effortlessly, as reliably as Zoot works for me and my work style.

And it really isn’t hard… it just looks that way.

Steve Z.

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